Justice in the Aftermath of Authoritarianism

Posted on 16 December 2025

Last week, our International Studies Research Cluster and York Centre for Conflict and Security held a talk and film screening on Justice in the Aftermath of Authoritarianism.

We focused on how authoritarian legacies continue to shape politics, memory, and justice after Brazil’s 1964–1985 military dictatorship.

Our guest speaker was Professor Enea de Stutz e Almeida (University of Brasilia) who served as President of the Amnesty Commission of the Ministry of Human Rights and Citizenship in Brazil.

What were the main takeaways?

The terms of Brazil’s transition allowed the military to retain significant power into the country’s democratic period, resulting in a great deal of inertia in dealing with the past since 1985.
Brazil’s 1979 Amnesty Law, which granted perpetrators of violence immunity from prosecution, remains a major barrier to securing justice.
The 1979 Amnesty Law was upheld in 2010; but is currently being challenged through three test cases at the Supreme Court, including the case of Rubens Paiva (from the film I’m Still Here). There are high hopes: if successful, these challenges will clear the path to further prosecutions
Central to this push is challenging the notion that the 1979 Amnesty Law was not a law of ‘forgetting’; that actually it was a law of ‘memory’.
Even if successful, there is still more work to be done: the notion of ‘victimhood’ needs to be expanded beyond direct political opponents of the regime to encompass others who suffered from the dictatorship, such as indigenous peoples.
Looking ahead, justice processes have to be more 'bottom up' and have traction with the wider population. They must support people's experiences of democracy in Brazil as well as strengthen that democracy in the face of the continued authoritarian challenge posed by the phenomenon of Bolsonaro and the far right.